Making it count: teacher learning in liminal spaces

ABSTRACT

There is broad international recognition of the importance of ongoing professional learning opportunities for educators. Despite this seemingly global consensus, there is disagreement regarding the best ways to conceptualise teacher learning, and what kinds of learning should be promoted or counted. This article reports on a narrative inquiry which explores how three Israeli primary school teachers experience and understand the role and significance of professional learning in their professional lives. In interviews and written narratives, the participants share experiences of profoundly important learning in what I call liminal spaces, beyond schools and formal professional development programmes. In this article, I explore powerful learning occurring on the border between the personal and professional lives of teachers. This study conceptualises teacher learning as complex and messy. The findings contribute to and challenge some of the existing knowledge base of teacher learning, especially studies that seek to standardise and quantify learning and thereby overlook potent forms of professional learning. I offer practical recommendations for individual teachers, school leadership, fellow researchers and policy makers.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher learning
• professional development
• accountability
• narrative
• narrative inquiry
• liminal spaces

Acknowledgments

I am grateful for the encouragement and support of my PhD supervisors, Associate Professor Graham Parr and Dr Scott Bulfin. I also appreciate the assistance from Associate Professor Larissa Aronin at the Oranim College of Education and the feedback from my anonymous peer reviewers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.